Chuck Most

I'm not sure what you mean, are you asking about cutting the kit windshield? I didn't do that- I just cut material out of the a-pillars and made a new windshield from .010" styrene. The windshield molding was made from D-strip plastic, it overlaps the opening a bit and the clear plastic is glued onto the inside. The air filter is the same Testors Mythical Maroon I used on the body- I gave the vanes in the air cleaner a black wash. It actually isn't a bad match for a K&N element in scale.

But if you're building an '80's street machine or some high-school kid's ride, you need the yellow wires! (And red boots...) Sometimes cheap is just the look you want.

This was the 25th Hornet I've built, so it had to be at least an attempt at "epic", right? The idea was a late '90's Pro Touring style, with a few traditional custom touches. To that end, the top was chopped and "hardtopped', the hood was sectioned, tunneled headlights from an AMT '49 Mercury, a custom grille, shaved bumpers, and tail fins and lamps from the Foose Cadillac. Trim was eliminated and/or painted charcoal grey. The rear window is the stock size, just tipped forward. The wheels and tires are from Jimmy Flintstone- the white metal wheels had the rims polished, while the centers were painted in the same charcoal paint used for the trim. Other than the wheel rims, the only other bright work is the slash-cut exhaust pipes cut from K&S tubing and set into the bumper. After leaning toward a metallic silver paint job (hence the grey/black interior), I ultimately opted for a metallic red. I think that George Poteet's Trepainer-built "Sniper" '53 Plymouth may have influenced me a bit in a few areas on this one. The engine is the factory 308 block, but the idea was "What if somebody dropped off a Hudson block at Uncommon Engineering with a blank check and told Steve to just 'go crazy'". To that end, the engine is fitted with a scratch built DOHC head and manifolds, a turbo from Hobby Design, and an all new front cover/accessory drive with an alternator, A/C compressor, and power steering pump. The air cleaner is an open-element type with a factory Hudson air cleaner top. The interior is actually the most tame part- aside from a Detail Master gauge panel, a photoreduced CD player stereo unit, parts-box center console with shifter and hand brake, and Taurus SHO seats it's mostly out of the box. Now that I think of it I used a Momo steering wheel and a parts box column as well. With the car being red I wish I'd gone with a tan interior, but the dark grey/black one looks good enough, and it's barely visible from the outside anyway. After toying around with a few side mirror ideas, I ultimately opted to use the factory units, stripped of chrome and painted the same charcoal black as the rest of the "de-chromed" bits.

Welcome aboard, Mike.

Very cool!

I've wanted to build an abandoned custom car for a while, and to do another custom Hornet convertible, so I killed two birds with one stone on this one. I also wanted to do a car with Jade Idol-style quad headlights, so... three birds with one stone, I guess? So here it is, a custom built by some young guy in the early '60's that never got 100% finished, then spent a long time mothballed and was recently unearthed. Wire wheels from the '52 Mel's club coupe were used on the front, and the suspension was lowered. A spare Hudson body coughed up the forward parts of it's fenders for the lower headlights, and the custom grille was hand made, along with the rockers and skirts. The Carson-style top is an old R&R vacuum formed piece meant for a '49 Mercury, it was reworked to fit the Hornet body and integrated with some plated moldings. Rear quarters and tail lights from a '56 Chevrolet were also grafted into the body. The hood was sectioned and laid back- I left the "surgical scars" exposed and highlighted them with some rust effects. The interior is stock aside from the padded custom steering wheel from an AMT '49 Mercury kit, and the 308 Twin H straight six was left totally stock. I tried for a yellowed, aged look on the whitewalls, but wasn't happy with it, so let's just say this has had new tires installed since it's discovery.

Looks great! I always like to have a couple of these kits in the arsenal at all times- I think they're one of Tamiya's best offerings ever.

Nice! Love the turtle deck and the fact you kept the stock four-banger.

I thought Lumpy was the baby wookie from the Star Wars Holiday Special.

This started out as a way to get rid of some cast-off parts from other projects and some leftover odds and ends. The engine was fitted with a Morgan Automotive Detail finned head, and a three-carb turbocharger setup. The body was an abandoned phantom business coupe idea- I decided to make the car look like an old/unfinished custom job that was unearthed and reborn as a ratty rod. I modified the dash to resemble a '48-'50 style dash, but retained the '51-'53 style windshield and side window trim, modified to work with the new roof line, of course. The grille is a cut down Terraplane piece from RatrodzRus, fitted with a '52 hood ornament. The taillights are '54 pieces. Those, the hood ornament, and the rear bumper, are about the only parts on the model that weren't reworked in some way or another.

Just nabbed this '68 Lincoln a few days ago. I'm pondering not replacing the forward part of the roof for the rebuild. I am very glad that it came with the stock bumpers though.

Oh well, you'll just have to catch herpes the old fashioned way.

A Reo by Rowley? You have my full and undivided attention.

Thanks! Solves that little mystery for me.

Maybe I missed this in the conversation, but was this based on a stock Barracuda kit? I ask because there's a slant six intake manifold on one of the parts runners.

Thanks everyone. First post has been edited to show the completed boat. AMC did look into that, but they determined it would not have been worth the effort, as a pickup model would have cut into production of the more profitable wagon models.

Bare Metal foil was used on the scripts- I applied it to the raw plastic then knocked off the primer and paint rather than try to foil each individual letter. It's the old JoHan snap kit. As far as I know it hasn't been reissued since the '80's but they're still out there. Thanks guys!

This started out as the Johan Cross Country wagon. It was reworked just a little bit to represent a period-style custom, the way it may have looked if it had gotten into the hands of a custom shop when it was new or nearly new. The grille, headlight pods, and bezels are from an AMT '57 Ford, while the club plaque and side pipes are from the '59 El Camino. I think the tail lights were the custom ones from a Johan '63 Plymouth- the taillight pods were made from plastic tubing. Paint is Testors Icy Blue and the wheels are Crossbars from Pegasus- they included the small wide whites. The kit includes simulated Ambassador side trim on the decal sheet- these were trimmed down to fit with the deleted rear doors and radiused front wheel openings. The boat and trailer are the AMT '59 Chris Craft kit, with a modified Moebius Hornet engine and decals from Matty Winspur's '54 Hornet drag car.

This was mostly thrown together box stock, other than the addition of big and little tires and Cragar wheels from the Monogram '37 Ford coupe, a parts box side view mirror (Revell '64 Impala, maybe?) and aluminum tube exhaust tips.

Newer style grille, but they were GMC Astros.

Would it have a market outside Brazil, though?

I like it

This was just a quick, box-stock buildup of a Carina as restyled by Autopista. The Carina is basically a four-door version of a Celica. I liked this version because it kind of looks like a grandma car with a body kit. All I did was blend in the ground effects at the wheel openings a little better. I'm still not great at painting rub strips, but I'm getting there.

This is the '53 Teague stock car kit, done as a fictional La Carrera Panamericana racer. I used the whitewall tires on the front and the full exhaust system from the '53 club coupe kit, and removed the fender skirts, but other than that and some parts box decals I pretty much kept it box-stock. It has some scuffs and scrapes in the paint to represent a car driven from the Great Lakes region to Mexico, maybe sometime later I'll weather it to look post-race. I also found out how robust the Moebius kit can be with this one- during assembly, the nearly completed car took a three foot tumble onto the floor.... not a thing on it broke or came loose.

This was one of those fun, one-day projects, based on the curbside Tamiya kit. The car was lowered, and fitted with tires from Revell's Cadillac lowrider. The Caddy's outer wheel rims were also used, but centers from a Revell '57 Ford were turned down and inserted into them, and capped with Tamiya S800 hubcaps. The car was also fitted with a straight pipe and fender mirrors from a Subaru 360. Then it was treated to a coat of rust and dust. Other than some silvering on some of the Rat Fink decals, I'm happy with the way it came out. The "Too fast to live, too young to die- Cream Soda" front plate is from a Fujimi wheel set. I guess the Japanese take cream soda very, very seriously.